


Easy as falling

by cuneifire (orphan_account)



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Book 6: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, M/M, Pining, Regret
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-24
Updated: 2019-07-24
Packaged: 2020-07-12 14:44:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 808
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19947880
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/cuneifire
Summary: It hits him like a punch straight to the mouth, that he’s never seen Malfoy smile before.Which makes this all the more disconcerting becauseright now he is.





	Easy as falling

The dungeon is dark and dank and Snape is too busy giving the lesson, and somehow Harry ends up looking at Malfoy. He thinks Ron might be fed up with him, and most of Gryffindor might be upset, and Hermione might complain about his supposed obsession, but he could swear. He  _ knew  _ something was up with Malfoy. 

He’d been looking something awful this whole year, and trying even harder to make up for it- Harry touched the bridge of his nose absentmindedly- but he still couldn’t hide the fact that he walked as though he carried the whole weight of the world on his shoulder, that he looked paler than any healthy person should. 

And in class, he kept slumping forwards as if to fall asleep, which Harry knew for a fact he had never done before. 

Harry squinted his eyes, peering over Seamus’ shoulder, trying to get a better look at him. His left sleeve was riding up, but nowhere near his elbow, not enough to show the Mark-

Through half-lidded eyes, Malfoy caught Harry’s gaze. At first Harry was pretty sure he was asleep, but then he blinks, and straightens his back. 

Then he looks at Harry, and his lips curve up. 

It hits him like a punch straight to the mouth, that he’s never seen Malfoy smile before. 

Which makes this all the more disconcerting because  _ right now he is.  _

The room suddenly feels about ten times brighter- and warmer too, Harry didn’t know the dungeons could  _ do  _ that. But he’s distracted from the sudden shift in temperature by the thought that Malfoy’s eyes are brilliantly bright, that his lips are red and his skin looks kind of soft. Even the smudges of purple lining his eyes don’t seem too bad. 

He looks… different when he smiles. Like- like he’s a human being, not a statue of gossamer and condescension. Like he might  _ enjoy  _ life instead of solely snipe at it. Like he might feel regret. 

“Potter.” 

It takes him a whole ten seconds to realise that Snape is given him a glare that could kill armies, and that there's a sharp pain eating away at his foot where the vial in his hand was supposed to be. 

“Do tell, what on  _ earth  _ could be so bloody important as to distract you from the fact that you are making a potion supposed to  _ dissolve the lining of one’s stomach!” _ He took one step forward, eyes narrowed. 

Harry snapped from his daze. 

“Ah- wha- wait, what?” 

“Potter.”  _ That  _ was the voice Snape used when Harry was in for three months of detention with Filch. And Harry couldn’t be having that, because- well, he had to follow Malfoy. 

Snape was still talking. 

“ _ What were you thinking! _ ” 

Harry looked up. The acid was sort of starting to hurt. He glanced over and saw that Malfoy had turned away now, his smile replaced by a smirk. Harry thought he’d look a lot nicer if he smiled more. 

“I- uh-” Snape was still glaring at him. “-Nothing, sir.” 

Snape raised an eyebrow. “Twenty points from Gryffindor.” He says, and Harry can  _ hear  _ the Slytherins snicker. But he’s still looking at Malfoy. 

*

Malfoy does it again, a few weeks later, and Harry nearly falls over. Hermione shoots him a concerned glance. During dinnertime at the Great Hall, Malfoy winks at him, and Harry ends up pouring juice all over his roast beef. 

The fourth time, Harry smiles back. Malfoy goes a faint red and doesn’t look away. 

*

When Harry looks at Malfoy’s name on the map, he wonders if he’s chasing down a Death Eater, and enemy, a mirage, or just a boy. 

_ A boy who Harry... _

He falls asleep with the map on his lap, not knowing how to finish that sentence. 

*

Years later, when all is settled and he has a loving wife and three children and a stable job, he still wonders. It niggles at him, sometimes, when he’s watching Lily and James play and wonders why something feels  _ not quite right.  _

But then Ginny takes his hand and he forgets. 

Mostly. 

*

It hits him in the middle of the night one day, with the moonlight filtering through the curtains and Ginny lying next to him, sleeping soundly. The whole world is quiet and Harry is thirty three and he’s sweltering hot even though it’s the dead of winter. 

He’s an idiot, he thinks. He’s such a fucking moron he doesn’t even know what to do about it, so he leaves his wand on the desk and picks up an old broom and hooks a leg over it and the wind whips in his hair and he can’t shut his eyes, because he’s opened them now and he can't go back to sleep and-

He was in love. 

  
And he was such an idiot that he never  _ noticed. _


End file.
